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What Are The Ingredients For A Good Wonder Woman Television Series?

We look at previous adaptations of the character for the small screen to identify what works, and what didn't.

Wonder Woman is sort of an elusive character. Who she is and what attributes define her are sometimes difficult to explain, which is one of the reasons why she is so difficult to write well, and may be one reason why film and television executives have stayed away from adaptations of her character. She is a super powered woman who stands for very specific principles but her heritage and her background are so unique that it is nearly impossible to make audiences relate to her. She is an Amazon warrior woman and also a compassionate character but if tested and pushed to her limits, she is ruthless. She has grace, beauty, charm and charisma; and if she sounds a little like a perfect woman, that right there may be one of her biggest flaws.

For the last several years we have heard rumors of a Wonder Woman movie or television series. We even saw the pilot to a Wonder Woman TV show written by David E. Kelley (Ally McBeal) that (thankfully) never got off the ground. More recently, following the success of Arrow for the CW, the network has looked to Diana for their next potential superhero inspired television series. Yet, unlike Arrow, Wonder Woman isn't exactly black and white. She's far less grounded than Oliver Queen and a whole heck of a lot more complicated. Beyond that, there have also been a lot of different versions of her character. So how do you make a good Wonder Woman television series? What are the ingredients to make something like this work? To answer this question, we looked at what is wrong with the character and what we feel would not translate well onto the small screen.

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The Wonder Woman Origin

In her comic book origin, Diana is sculpted out of clay by her Mother with the blessings of the Olympian Goddesses. She is raised as a great warrior on a peaceful island made up only of women. This entire idea, while interesting, is impossible for the average person to relate to. Take for example a character like Superman; he may have been an alien who crash landed in Smallville, but he was raised by a warm and loving Mid-Western family. The fact that he also has estranged parents sort of helps his character be more relatable to audiences. It humanizes him in a way because although he is so strong and essentially "super human," he has average problems that a regular person could relate to. The made of clay origin and the being raised on an island of women doesn't exactly work because it is difficult explain in a real world environment. If that origin is kept, the fact that she comes from a completely different place needs to be meshed into the story. How do you explain her origin but set her story in the real world?

In the current Wonder Woman comic book series, Diana's origin story was changed. In it, Hippolyta falls in love with Zeus and they conceive a child -- Diana. She grows up not knowing her father and thinking she had no male figure in her life. This creates a very interesting dynamic and one that grounds her character. It demonstrates that she has "regular people problems," not just "I have to save the world," problems and I think that is important. Whatever origin this next show chooses to use, in order to make it feel grounded and to appeal to a mass audience, Diana will have to feel relatable on an emotional level.

The Costume

None of Wonder Woman's costumes have been very good. Her original costume with the skirt, while cute, was impractical. The red, white and blue strapless leotard with red knee high boots; while iconic, ridiculous to actually fight in. The pants and strapless top worn by actress Adrianne Palicki on the most recent attempt at an adaptation for a Wonder Woman television series may have been better than the previous two mentioned, but it still does not really work. The texture was shiny and looked cheap, and as good as Palicki's acting was in the pilot episode of that show, even she could not make that costume look better.

Regardless, the character definitely needs a costume redesign both for her current comic book series as well as in the CW television show. We recently saw an incredible redesign of her costume that went viral illustrated by artist Rahzahh. The best thing about this costume design is the fact that it takes many of the elements of her costume (the eagle emblem and the red, white and blue stars and stripes) and incorporates them into a new costume that not only covers her entire body and looks practical, but it is more fitting for a warrior than a skimpy bathing suit. She looks cool and looks believable, like she could kick major butt, and I think that's important.

Tone

If it's going to air on the CW, then it's likely to target a very specific, teenage demographic. Although I will be the first to say that there are a lot of elements of Arrow that I find cheesy, overall I think it does a relatively good job walking the line between the unbelievable and grounded in reality. In order for this show to work the tone needs to make the story feel grounded. Mind you, grounded does not necessarily mean dark, but it does mean more serious. If you focus on relating the character to audiences on an emotional level, chances are you will have more luck with the show. It also needs to be well written and consistent. It needs to focus on her flaws and imperfections as well as her battles.

Consider The Budget and Cameo Appearances

Obviously you can't expect that every single member of the Justice League is going to show up for her television show, and although seeing many familiar faces on the CW's Arrow series has been fun a lot of the time, the majority of these characters are street level at best. Wonder Woman is super powered, and if you can't show her doing crazy stunts, then don't even try.

It is also important to look at the character's identity and consider what other characters are important and supplemental to her story. Artemis, Hippolyta and Ares, for example, are vital to the Wonder Woman mythos and are a group of characters that should absolutely be featured on the show.

If it were up to me, I would personally focus on her youth and younger years, much like the CW did for Smallville. It is impossible to really relay all of Superman's feats as an adult hero without spending a whole lot of money, and it's easier and more cost effective to tell the story of his youth. The same can be said for Wonder Woman. The show could easily focus on Diana's youth and her years on Paradise Island and still remain cost effective. It would also explore her character and identity in ways we haven't yet seen which would definitely add to her story.

What do you think, though? What do you think that the CW's upcoming Amazon should be like? Should it be set in present day, or on Paradise Island? How much of Wonder Woman's mythology should be kept? What should the show's focus be on? What characters would you like to see and should her costume be changed? Let us know in the comments below.

The show could easily focus on Diana's youth and her years on Paradise Island and still remain cost effective. It would also explore her character and identity in ways we haven't yet seen which would definitely add to the story.

I would do a Wonder Woman tv show as diana in high school like Smallville season 1 which was set in Smallville high school. Diana will secretly be a member of a ninja sorority called amazons so no super powers and just ninja fighting skills. Amazons will just be normal females and no immortality but they are descended from the amazons of greek mythology. I prefer amazons as female versions of the male only Freemasons. Amazons can be done like female batman or female League of Shadows. For more fantasy, can give amazons more advanced science so amazons have experimented on themselves to make themselves smarter and stronger and live longer than other humans. Bourne Legacy power levels or Deathstroke/Captain America power levels would be more believable.

where did the picture for the costume section come from? aside from the pauldrons that would look wicked in her on-going series (though not look great live action) the problem with her costume is none have really had an ancient greek overtone except when she wears full armor. I don't see why something similar to what Brad Pitt wore in Troy (mins helmet and slim down the shoulder sections rather than remove them) wouldn't work full time in Wonder Woman's colors. Yeah, the skirt look is a bit dated but as the Amazons never changed from ancient times it would be appropriate. The colors should also not reflect America (a bit dated in concept overall) but instead reflect the virtues that Diana represents.

I would do a Wonder Woman tv show as diana in high school like Smallville season 1 which was set in Smallville high school. Diana will secretly be a member of a ninja sorority called amazons so no super powers and just ninja fighting skills. Amazons will just be normal females and no immortality but they are descended from the amazons of greek mythology. I prefer amazons as female versions of the male only Freemasons. Amazons can be done like female batman or female League of Shadows. For more fantasy, can give amazons more advanced science so amazons have experimented on themselves to make themselves smarter and stronger and live longer than other humans. Bourne Legacy power levels or Deathstroke/Captain America power levels would be more believable.

I did watch Bourne Legacy with my wife and I enjoyed the scenes set in my home country the Philippines and many characters were talking in Tagalog. So you can do a Wonder Woman tv show like Bourne Legacy with the secret society amazons having the super soldier formula so that explains why Wonder Woman is smarter and stronger than normal humans.

Good idea but I think that a movie would be better for her so it could minimize the cheezyness. Also it needs the right actress, especially if it is a more teenage/realistic style, which could work well if dome right.

Tbh, I just have a hard time seeing it actually work...not every hero needs to have a live action TV show, not all of them would be able to work properly in doing so. I am actually surprised that Smallville worked out so well, but that just seemed to be one of those rare things.

Honestly they could do a story where she thinks she molded from clay, but that was a lie or a euphemism by her mother and she looks for her father in the real world. She would go into the world wearing the crazy amazon armor and figure out that isn't normal there and therefore dump that stuff for street clothes. She can then go around in those street clothes until some final episode jazz where she finds the classic wonder women suit. The story itself would be her finding clues for who her father is while meeting guest appearances as so and so and doing the occasional fight. Maybe someone from the island is jealous of her and she's the big bad. This is all speculative and made up in ten seconds of thought, but it would be an okay adaptation of wonder women for a t.v show.

Dear god this comment section is full of bullshit. Just adapt Gods and Mortals into a movie god damnit. And none of this realism or costume change crap was thrown around when they announced the Thor movie. And yet you complain about the Nolan films being in accurate.......you people DESERVE more Green Lamtern quality films.

Feels like I'm the last person on earth that WANTS cheese in their superhero shows/movies. They're based on COMIC BOOKS. If anybody is going to try and convince me that comic books aren't silly and cheesy they can get out of town. Marvel has embraced the bombast of comic books in their adaptations but DC seems to be hiding all their properties behind a veil of "realism" and making them dark and gritty and it's just nonsense. I'm not saying everything has to be silver age Batman like the 60s TV show and I know budget can be a major issue, but give me WW in full costume fighting fricken MYTHOLOGICAL MONSTERS. Showcase her crazy ass family like Azzarello is doing now. Hell just make it a fricken Xena reboot. There are a bunch of ways they could adapt the character and make an excellent show but as long as everybody wants every DC show/movie to be a rip off of Nolan's Batman movies it's always going to fail.

This may sound crazy but to me since back when NBC announced it's Wonder Woman (which as we know fell through) I've felt that this would be the best option for a series. Lets borrow from some other successful series. For starts I would start with her adulthood, we take the fish out of water approach you had in something like Smallville and something teens can relate with (or at least something I could relate with when I was a teen), and have here dealing with being in "Man's World" now. Next you take a queue from Xena and have her as a warrior battling Gods and monsters and the occasional megalomaniacs. Then finally place it all in a modern setting, a la Supernatural. I'm sure many would disagree with me but in my opinion that might be the best way to do it. Maybe use Brian Azzarello's current run as a starting point. And I completely agree on the costume. Something like the above would be perfect and preferable.

Dc has proven with Vertigo that it is better in doing adult material and the realistic Batman also proves Warner Brothers is better in doing realistic. I am ok with dc sticking to what it can do best instead of copying Marvel movies.

As a huge Wonder Woman fan the fact that Diana is being reduced to a television show is upsetting to me. She is one of the three most recognizable and iconic superheroes in the histoy of comics and yet she gets treated like a D list character. I mean seriously Green Lantern got a movie before Wonder Woman (also a big fan of GL). Wonder Woman needs to be treated with the respect that she deserves and she needs to be given a movie and not just a decent movie but a good one. WB is good at hiring writers and directors that understand Superman and Batman, but they can't seem to get the same response for their other characters.

While Wonder Woman is a superhero the one thing that noone seems to be able to get right about her is that you cannot treat her like one. Wonder Woman is an Amazon warrior and therefore she must be treated as one. She must be treated as a warrior, the same way that Thor is treated and the same way that Hercules is treated. Just look to Xena for inspiration on making a Wonder Woman movie. Put a spear in one hand, a sword in the other, a shield on her back, golden bands around her forearms, and spartan boots on her feet.

If they can get a similar balance of classic with some updates and a mix of mystic and modern like Thor had then that should be a good starting point. Though that's the inherent issue with comic book adaptations, if you go for something close to the comics themselves then you tend to lose the general audience but if you stray away too far from the source material, regardless of the films quality, then you've missed the point of an adaptation. If the film could have been made without the license at all so what was the point beyond marketing? There has to be some kind of balance between the two without delving too far into the other and that's hard to do, so there's no real easy or obvious answer for what should be done here.

That costume wouldn't be the right redesign for the simple fact that it looks medieval instead of greek. All DC has to do to redesign Wonder Woman's costume is change the colors and tweak a couple things from Xena's costume.

I think if they make a Wonder Woman TV show or movie they should base it off the new series right now. It's the Justice League cartoon that made me read the comics and now it's the new series that's making me love her character more. Like as much as Lynda Carter made Wonder Woman, that show can get kinda cheesy. I feel like WW should be taken more seriously if they want anything of hers to work. Unfortunately, there are fans of WW out there that just want her going back to the time with bad writing.

People insist on this "Relatable/not relatable" stuff. Seriously, I'm sure no one found any kind of relate between their lives and the old Wonder Woman show yet it was somehow successful.

If I could make a Script it would be with great amount of action so people who likes action series would like even if not much in comic books, and please none of romance, or this "real woman cliched".

Exactly, I don't understand the obsession that this writer and other people seem to have with comic book movies and TV shows being relatable. Yeah it's cool when it happens but it's not totally necessary. And I totally agree with your idea for the show, a great amount of action without it being bogged down with some lame romance.

It seems as if it could be more expensive to tell the story of Diana's youth on Themyscira. Partly because of all the sets and costumes you'd need to give the ancient Greek setting.

I do love that Wonder Woman costume redesign. It sort of shows that they should look outside of establishment comic people to make costumes. Just look at Batman now. In the comics, he has the ARKHAM CITY design. Comics need to stop thinking skin tight bathing suits and start thinking about clothes.

i really just want to see a proper Wonder Woman movie, and it could lead into the JLA movie, i'm not saying Warner Brothers should go the marvel route and give each character their own movie but at least give the third most recognizable JLA member her own movie!

1: I fervently believe that a W.W. series should adapt stories and elements from the George Perez and Phil Jimeniz run, as that was W.W.'s peak as a seriously cool but tough comic hero. Changing the origin to fit the New 52 would work since that's recent and Diana is still cool but tough.

2: Her costume should cover everything it's supposed to while keeping a Greek warrior feel to it!

3: I think the show should have NOTHING to do with other DC other comics (Justice League, all 400 Batman titles...) and focus soley on all W.W. characters. Hippolyta, Artemis, Hermes, Ares, Circe etc. Donna Troy would be cool if they could figure out a consistent origin for once.

I really dislike the Rahzahh version of the suit, it loses everything that thematically shapes the Wonder Woman costume. Now, this Donna Troy armor keeps with the similar silhouette while also remaining practical looking and essentially still "the character". Very nice find.

If they did Zena they can do Wonder Woman. Going the younger path like Smallville means that they will have to take the story line away from the comic book a lot, it might work like it did for Smallville. But on a place called paradise island how many problems can there possibly be.

@dondave: Thanks I just looked her up. I guess I have to keep an eye out for her on GI JOE Retaliation, buttah it also says she was on Smallville. She was Kara? Did she get an operation? To me she looks totally different. Not that I'm complaining I just can't believe that's the same girl.

maybe its the brown hair.

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Dear god this comment section is full of bullshit. Just adapt Gods and Mortals into a movie god damnit. And none of this realism or costume change crap was thrown around when they announced the Thor movie. And yet you complain about the Nolan films being in accurate.......you people DESERVE more Green Lamtern quality films

If they are already thinlig about guest-stars I for one would like them to keep them WW related. I would also like to see Nubia make an appearance. She was supposed to show up in the Lynda Carter series. I would also like to see Cheetah and the other members of Villainy Inc.

Here are a few ideas. Let's assume WW comes from Themyscira, Amazons, divine gifts and some reason to be in the wider world as emissary. The series would be set in the wider world and only occasionally refer to Themyscira. If required have it blocked off or have only intermittent access. Guest stars would be the Queen, maybe several amazons like Artemis, possibly some rogue amazons. I would tie characters like Circe and Paula von Gunther into the earlier history of the island. Steve Trevor could be ex military, who is "drafted" into being WW's minder after he is the first man to contact the island at the same time something happens that require the amazons to break their isolation from the rest of the world.

1) Make her a fish out of water, but don't make her stupid or clueless. Diana comes from an insular culture and she would be amazed at our modern world and need time to adjust to it. But don't make her lack all form of analytical thinking and empathy and let her blunder blindly through one humiliating gaffe after the other. Set her up so the audience thinks she's going to fail and then she cleverly averts it. Have people constantly underestimate her intelligence and assume she is a primitive savage and then have her turn the tables on them.

2) WW comes from a culture that isn't weighed down by centuries of Judeo-Christian tradition. WW's idea of a sin would be radically different from our assumptions. She's in the unique position of being an objective outsider in our modern world, she is perfectly situated to tell us the Emperor has no clothes. She can be a conscience for our modern world and ask the kind of questions we don't dare ask.

3) Give her enemies she can't easily defeat either in combat or with wits. Diana is the spirit of truth in the age of spin, conspiracies, yellow journalism, smear campaigns, manipulation etc. One ideal foil would be a nasty, arrogant Rush Limbaugh radio talkshow host who just waits for her to fail so he can gloat. He's dragging her through the mud and blames her for everything. If she dares lay a finger on him, his audience doubles.

4) She is partly responsible for her own enemies. Some kind of ancient magic was released from Themyscira and Diana has to put it back into the box, but it's almost impossible to control so she has to fix things as best she can. The magic has affected a number of people in various ways and they are now on a rampage.

5) She is a bright light in a jaded, cynical world. She has ideals, decency, honesty and she is honest to the point of being blunt, She represents a glimmer of hope, she is an example to many. Even if our world does its best to take her down a peg or two, she fights back with all her might and beliefs.

6) She can be a complete badass. She needs a moment when the audience is sitting on the edge of their chair and then give them an epic resolution that makes people leap up and cheer. She needs a major fist pumping, high fiving, "I can't believe she did that." moment.

7) Diana needs a supporting cast of regular people. Steve Trevor, Etta Candy, maybe some guy/gal who has a crush on her, an antagonistic high ranking official who is stuck with WW and wants her to go away. Maybe a potential traitor or somebody who will betray her at a bad moment. Maybe one or two amazons sent along with WW and their less than successful attempts to fit in with our world.

There are plenty of opportunities to make her a unigue and interesting character without having to resort to stupid writing like "dark and gritty", dumbing her down or devolve into self-conscious parody of herself.

As for the costume, have her appear in the classic costume earlier in the first episode and then introduce a new costume if required.

My final suggestion would be to do an episode where she meets a man in a blue box, if only to cause a massive ripple into the force.

That costume wouldn't be the right redesign for the simple fact that it looks medieval instead of greek. All DC has to do to redesign Wonder Woman's costume is change the colors and tweak a couple things from Xena's costume.

I agree with the sentiment that a younger version of Wonder Woman would make the show more grounded, more easily relatable and probably more ost effective and efficient. But why should we be trying to pare down Wonder Woman when she should be reaching for the stars? Anything lower than what we've seen from the likes of Smallville and Arrow (and to a lesser extent, Birds of Prey), will set back the idea that a female superhero can front a show. And I mean an actual superhero, not like Buffy or Dark Angel.

Besides, the same could be said for any superhero - exploring their origins. Think of Spider-Man or even Batman. They are massive names in the comics world and their origin stories are well known, yet they have never been portrayed in a live action tv show. I imagine it would be easier to sell that idea as well, seeing that they still have movies that people flock to. But therein lies my case that comics are seen primarily as for the boys and a real shake up is needed. I want to see Wonder Woman working wonders, not as a child unsure of herself.